Enforcing copyright law — whether through DMCA takedown notices, domain name seizures, etc — is not in the same league. Yet, copyright critics almost reflexively apply the label of “censorship” to any attempt at better protecting the rights of creators.

Today, I want to put a bookend on these previous discussions of free speech and copyright by looking at some of the broader issues in the debate.

On Censorship

The “copyright as censorship” comparison permeates much of the discussion surrounding free speech and copyright. It’s often noted that early copyright law grew out of press licensing statutes that were passed to both protect proprietary rights of book publishers and allow governments to control seditious publications. The dual purpose of copyright law at the time is probably more coincidental than anything; France, for example, had no copyright law at that time, yet still maintained censorship over the press. 2Visit Voltaire: Voltaire Bio. Nevertheless, copyright law today is completely divorced from any sort of government control over content. If copyright is censorship, it hardly resembles the type of censorship the Belarus Free Theatre faces.

Supreme Court Justice John Marshall Harlan II described what he calls the “typical censorship situation” and its associated dangers in a 1964 dissent:

In the typical censorship situation material is brought as a matter of course before some administrative authority, who then decides on its propriety. This means that the State establishes an administrative structure whereby all writings are reviewed before publication. By contrast, if the State uses its penal system to punish expression outside permissible bounds, the State does not comprehensively review any form of expression; it merely considers after the event utterances it has reason to suppose may be prohibited. The breadth of its review of expression is therefore much narrower and the danger that protected expression will be repressed is less.

…

There are built-in elements in any system of licensing or censorship, the tendency of which is to encourage restrictions of expression. The State is not compelled to make an initial decision to pursue a course of action, since the original burden is on the citizen to bring a piece of writing before it. The censor is a part of the executive structure, and there is at least some danger that he will develop an institutionalized bias in favor of censorship because of his particular responsibility. In a criminal proceeding, however, the burden is on the State to act, the decision-maker belongs to an independent branch of the government, and neither a judge nor a juror has any personal interest in active censorship.

…

One danger of a censorship system is that the public may never be aware of what an administrative agent refuses to permit to be published or distributed. A penal sanction assures both that some overt thing has been done by the accused and that the penalty is imposed for an activity that is not concealed from the public. In this case, the information charged that obscene books were possessed or kept for sale and distribution; presumably such possession, if knowing, could, as a constitutional matter, support a criminal prosecution. The procedure adopted by the State envisions that a full judicial hearing will be held on the obscenity issue. Finally, the federal system makes it highly unlikely that the citizenry of one State will be unaware of the kind of material that is being restricted by its own government when there is great divergence among the policies of the various States and a high degree of communication across state lines. 3Harlan dissent, Quantity of Copies of Books v. Kansas, 378 US 205, 222-24 (1964).

Thankfully, this “typical censorship situation” is largely an anachronism in the US today. It is worth noting some of Harlan’s points about what makes administrative censorship so dangerous to free expression, especially an institutionalized bias in favor of active censorship. Also notable is the distinction between executive censor and criminal proceeding — with less danger of restrictions on expression under the latter. This danger is attenuated further when we’re in a civil proceeding between two private parties, as most copyright infringement cases are.

However, what Harlan doesn’t talk about in this particular passage is the sine qua non of censorship: restricting expression because of disagreement over its content. Government censorship is typically targeted at suppressing politically dissident speech, or obscene and other “inappropriate” speech. This is where copyright as censorship arguments falter. It’s illogical to say that enforcement of piracy is based on a disagreement about the content — a copyright owner agrees completely with the content. 4Schnapper v. Foley, 667 F.2d 102 (DC Cir 1981), discusses the hypothetical situation of the government using copyright as a pretext for actual censorship. The court said, “Underlying the appellants’ First Amendment assault on the copyright obtained for ‘Equal Justice Under Law’ is their professed concern that the Government may one day attempt to use the copyright law as an instrument of censorship … We are aware that there is at least a theoretical possibility that some copyright laws may be used by some nations as instruments of censorship … We are unaware, however, of any effort on the part of the United States Government to throttle free expression through use of the copyright laws, and we are not inclined to hypothesize such an effort nor to hand down a decision invalidating an act of Congress on that hypothetical basis … We are confident that should the day come when the Government denies someone access to a work produced at its direction on the basis of a copyright, and if the doctrine of fair use and the distinction between an idea and its expression fail to vindicate adequately that person’s interests — although we have no reason to believe that they would — the courts of the United States would on the basis of facts, not hypotheses, consider afresh the First Amendment interests implicated thereby.” Cases of creative or transformative infringement do sometimes present issues where a copyright owner sues to stop a subsequent use she disagrees with, but as we’ll see, the doctrine of fair use provides a safeguard against censorship.

Prior Restraints

Closely related to censorship is the idea of “prior restraints.” In the First Amendment realm, prior restraints — suppression of speech before a final judicial determination that it is unprotected speech — are considered worse than punishment after speech has been made. 5Blackstone defined freedom of the press as freedom solely from prior restraints, “not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published.” Courts consequently take a deeply skeptical look at any type of law or regulation that resembles a prior restraint. This includes preliminary injunctions in civil lawsuits because they are granted only on the basis that speech is likely to be unprotected.

Yet courts routinely award preliminary injunctions in copyright infringement cases. The Supreme Court has even gone so far as to say that “The Congress has authorized a strain of prior restraints against private parties in certain instances … Article I, § 8, of the Constitution authorizes Congress to secure the “exclusive right” of authors to their writings, and no one denies that a newspaper can properly be enjoined from publishing the copyrighted works of another.” 6New York Times v. US, 403 US 713, White concurrence n.1 (1971).

What is it that makes courts treat copyright cases differently than other speech cases? The following excerpt provides a hint:

Moreover, freedom of thought and expression “includes both the right to speak freely and the right to refrain from speaking at all.” We do not suggest this right not to speak would sanction abuse of the copyright owner’s monopoly as an instrument to suppress facts. But in the words of New York’s Chief Judge Fuld:

“The essential thrust of the First Amendment is to prohibit improper restraints on the voluntary public expression of ideas; it shields the man who wants to speak or publish when others wish him to be quiet. There is necessarily, and within suitably defined areas, a concomitant freedom not to speak publicly, one which serves the same ultimate end as freedom of speech in its affirmative aspect.”

Courts and commentators have recognized that copyright, and the right of first publication in particular, serve this countervailing First Amendment value. 7Harper & Row v. Nation Enterprises, 471 US 539, 559-60 (1985).

First Amendment Opportunism

Before delving into the issue of the First Amendment and copyright, I want to take a quick look at the issue of “First Amendment opportunism.” 8A term coined by Frederick Schauer in First Amendment Opportunism. Free speech is one of the foundations of a democratic society. Censorship, the kind the Belarus Free Theatre faces, is ugly. As we’ll see, the question of whether copyright law adequately accounts for free speech is increasingly being asked, as well it should. But coloring the debate by alleging censorship — comparing the removal of a dancing baby video from a corporate video site to violent suppression of political dissidents — is a damaging use of hyperbole. It both minimizes the horrors of true censorship and paints opponents as evil rather than wrong.

At the same time, such language is merely an outgrowth of First Amendment opportunism in the copyright realm. What do I mean by this?

In some ways, the First Amendment is the “won’t somebody think of the children” of the legal world.

First Amendment scholar Frederick Schauer explains, “[T]he First Amendment, freedom of speech, and freedom of the press provide considerable rhetorical power and argumentative authority. The individual or group gaining the support of the First Amendment often believes, and often correctly, that it has secured the upper hand in public debate. The First Amendment not only attracts attention, but also appears to strike fear in the hearts of many who do not want to be seen as being against it.” Schauer calls this “First Amendment magnetism” and says it “leads strategic actors to gravitate to it as easily as politicians gravitate to the flag, motherhood, and apple pie.”

The magnetic force of the First Amendment generates two distinct phenomena. First, actors in the public arena (defined here to exclude the courts) are likely to rely on the First Amendment in pressing their causes, in the often-justified expectation that doing so will disproportionately, compared to relying on other dimensions of the law, attract allies, generate favorable attention by the press, and arouse the sympathies of other public actors. Second, lawyers representing clients with claims and causes not necessarily lying within the First Amendment’s core or traditional concerns will add First Amendment arguments and claims to their core claims, or will modify their core claims to connect them with First Amendment arguments, all in the hope that doing so will increase the probability of their success. 9Frederick Schauer, The Boundaries of the First Amendment: A Preliminary Exploration of Constitutional Salience, 117 Harvard Law Review 1765 (2004).

David McGowan has attributed much of the growing trend in constitutionalizing copyright to this First Amendment magnetism. He notes:

Many copyright scholars object to the way Congress deals with their subject. With good reason, they feel Congress wields a copyright ratchet: terms get longer, and the scope of rights gets wider, but never the reverse. The rare exception occurs when publishers ask Congress to shore up fair use rights to make it easier for authors to get information they need to produce works. On this account, Congress is simply a tool rich media conglomerates use to soak consumers, who are rationally ignorant of the shameless fleecing their “representatives” give them.

It’s no fun beating one’s head against a wall. So if the representative branches sell out, at least by academic standards, their power to do harm must be limited. Two things are needed: a non-representative forum, to limit the power of producer wealth, and a law that trumps Congress’s Article I power to grant exclusive rights to authors. The First Amendment seems like just the thing. Like copyright, it deals with expression, which makes almost any argument facially plausible. More importantly, in a conflict with Congress’s Article I power, the First Amendment trumps. 10David McGowan, Why the First Amendment Cannot Dictate Copyright Policy, 65 U. Pitt. L. Rev. 281 (2004).

What we’re talking about here is an opportunism in the nonpejorative sense. Recognizing the existence of this First Amendment magnetism is important when discussing copyright law. The issue is not one of copyright versus free speech, no matter how often it is framed as greedy creators against defenders of the First Amendment.

With that in mind, let’s take a look at the brief history of copyright and the First Amendment.

Copyright and the First Amendment: A Brief History

The US Constitution, which grants Congress the power to “To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries,” was completed September 17, 1787. It officially went into effect March 4, 1789. The first federal copyright law, the Copyright Act of 1790, was signed by President Washington on May 31, 1790. The First Amendment was adopted December 15, 1791.

For nearly 200 years, the relationship between the first amendment and copyright law received little if any attention from courts or scholars. This is not entirely surprising if you consider the fact that first amendment free speech jurisprudence as a whole has only emerged within the past hundred years. 14See Robert Post,Reconciling Theory and Doctrine in First Amendment Jurisprudence, 88 California Law Review 2353 (2000); but cf. David M. Rabban, Free Speech in its Forgotten Years, Cambridge Univ. Press 1999.

But despite all this academic attention toward a conflict between copyright and free speech, courts have consistently rejected separate First Amendment defenses in copyright infringement cases. On its face, this point understandably creates confusion; it’s easy to think that copyright is thus corrosive to free speech values. That’s not the case though.

As it turns out, copyright itself incorporates many of the same speech values that the First Amendment does.

Copyright’s Free Speech Values

The Supreme Court has on several occasions described copyright as the “engine of free expression.” By providing incentives to invest in creating and disseminating works, copyright drives new expression and ideas into the public sphere, benefiting everyone. Copyright infringement, especially wholesale piracy, short-circuits these incentives, creating a chilling effect on the creation of new works. Creators also have a continuing speech interest in their works, which copyright helps protect.

Copyright and the First Amendment thus serve many of the same values, just in different ways. They coexist rather than contradict. Lon Sobel explains this coexistence by demonstrating that the two operate in different spheres of influence:

The purpose of the first amendment is to guarantee freedom of expression. As Thomas I. Emerson had indicated, freedom of expression is necessary 1) to assure individual self-fulfillment, 2) to attain the truth, 3) to secure participation by the members of society in social and political decision making, and 4) to maintain a balance between stability and change in society.

Clearly none of these reasons for free expression is violated by the Copyright Act.

Individual self-fulfillment requires that man be free to express the beliefs and opinions he has formed in the process of developing his mind. As Emerson explained, expression is in fact an integral part in the development of ideas. “Hence suppression of … expression is an affront to the dignity of man.”

However, the expression of the beliefs and opinions of another, using the exact words the other used, is not any part of the development of one’s own ideas. True, “‘A dwarf standing on the shoulders of a giant can see farther than the giant himself.'” But any consideration of the ideas of another which is thoughtful enough to provoke new ideas in the mind of the reader, should also be thoughtful enough to enable the reader to restate his own new ideas. Thus, the Copyright Act prohibition of word-for-word copying of another can hardly be thought of as “an affront to the dignity” of the one who would have otherwise copied. The Copyright Act is merely an impediment to the one who would reap where he has not sown.

The attainment of truth depends upon free expression because no person or group can possess all knowledge. Truth is distilled from the volatile mixture of opposing opinions. But the expression of an opinion already expressed by another — in the same words used by that other — adds nothing to the search for truth. It is merely the repetition of an opinion that was already available from its original source. Nor is it an answer to allege that the infringer may be supplying customers the copyright holder was unable to supply. It is freshman economics that supply — to the extent it is variable — will increase to meet the demand.

Since the ascertainment of truth depends upon the consideration of every relevant fact and opinion, it is important that all members of society participate in social and political decision-making. Freedom of expression is necessary in order for people to participate truthfully and fully. Moreover, since, as the Declaration of Independence states, governments derive “their just powers from the consent of the governed,” the governed must have the freedom to express their consent — or lack of it. However, what is important in this regard is the participation of one’s self in the decision-making processes. The man who has expressed and copyrighted his own views has already contributed those views. The government is not further assisted by one who merely parrots that which has already been said. Therefore, copyright laws do not impede any useful participation in the decision-making processes.

[…]

In the sum and substance, the first amendment was designed to encourage and protect the communication of diverse ideas. Copyright laws, protecting as they do only particular expressions, do not conflict with any of the first amendment’s purposes. 20Copyright and the First Amendment: A Gathering Storm?, 19 Copyright Law Symposium (ASCAP) 43, 71-74 (1971).

Copyright’s Internal Handling of Free Speech

If copyright law and the First Amendment coexist, does that mean they never contradict? Of course not. But courts’ handling of First Amendment issues in copyright cases differs from its handling of First Amendment issues in other types of cases.

To understand why, we need to first look a little closer at how courts deal with free speech arguments in general. One District Court provides a little background:

Courts often have spoken of certain categories of expression as “not within the area of constitutionally protected speech” … But such judicial statements in fact are not literally true. All modes of expression are covered by the First Amendment in the sense that the constitutionality of their “regulation must be determined by reference to First Amendment doctrine and analysis.” Regulation of different categories of expression, however, is subject to varying levels of judicial scrutiny. Thus, to say that a particular form of expression is “protected” by the First Amendment means that the constitutionality of any regulation of it must be measured by reference to the First Amendment. 21Universal City Studios v. Reimerdes, 111 F.Supp.2d 294, 326 (SDNY 2000).

In one sense, all laws or regulations impact free speech to some extent. “[E]very civil and criminal remedy imposes some conceivable burden on First Amendment protected activities,” said the Supreme Court in Arcara v. Cloud Books. 22478 US 697, 706 (1986). “One liable for a civil damages award has less money to spend on paid political announcements or to contribute to political causes, yet no one would suggest that such liability gives rise to a valid First Amendment claim. Similarly, a thief who is sent to prison might complain that his First Amendment right to speak in public places has been infringed because of the confinement, but we have explicitly rejected a prisoner’s claim to a prison environment least restrictive of his desire to speak to outsiders.”

Frederick Schauer points out an important distinction between the “coverage” and the “protection” of the First Amendment. He notes:

Like any legal rule, the First Amendment is not infinitely applicable. Though many cases involve the First Amendment, many more do not. Thus, the acts, events, behaviors, and restrictions not encompassed by the First Amendment at all, that remain wholly untouched by the First Amendment, are the ones we will describe as not being covered by the First Amendment. It is not that the speech (or anything else) is not protected by the First Amendment. Rather, it is that the entire event does not present a First Amendment issue at all, and the government’s action is consequently measured against no First Amendment standard whatsoever. The First Amendment simply does not show up.

What sets copyright apart from other “speech” cases — obscenity, libel, “fighting words,” etc. — is that both the coverage and the protection of the First Amendment are handled internally rather than through the panoply of “rules, principles, maxims, standards,” and so on. The two major “built-in free speech safeguards” in copyright law are the idea-expression dichotomy and fair use.

Copyright protection doesn’t cover ideas, only the expression of those ideas. This distinction between ideas and expression has been called a “definitional balance” between free speech and copyright interests — a line between what is covered by the first amendment and what is not. Copyright provides an incentive to create and disseminate expression. By extension, the ideas expressed are also disseminated, benefiting the public. But protection ends where expression ends, and anyone is free to use the ideas in any given work. In a sense, the first amendment protects this “marketplace of ideas” but doesn’t extend to a “right to copy.” 24See Eldred v. Ashcroft, 537 US 186, 221 (2003): “The First Amendment securely protects the freedom to make — or decline to make — one’s own speech; it bears less heavily when speakers assert the right to make other people’s speeches.” Or, as one court bluntly put it:

We do not find any denial of freedom of expression to the “tape pirate”. What he seeks is not the freedom to express himself artistically or otherwise, but the right to make exact and identical copies of sound recordings produced by others. We fail to see as any protected first amendment right a privilege to usurp the benefits of the creative and artistic talent, technical skills, and investment necessary to produce a single long-playing record of a musical performance. 25US v. Bodin, 375 F.Supp 1265).

The fair use doctrine recognizes that some uses of copyrighted expression without the permission of the copyright owner are beneficial. Prior to the infusion of First Amendment rhetoric into the copyright realm, fair use was seen as an important component in furthering copyright’s constitutional purpose:

There are situations, nevertheless, in which strict enforcement of this monopoly would inhibit the very “Progress of Science and useful Arts” that copyright is intended to promote. An obvious example is the researcher or scholar whose own work depends on the ability to refer to and to quote the work of prior scholars. Obviously, no author could create a new work if he were first required to repeat the research of every author who had gone before him.The scholar, like the ordinary user, of course could be left to bargain with each copyright owner for permission to quote from or refer to prior works. But there is a crucial difference between the scholar and the ordinary user. When the ordinary user decides that the owner’s price is too high, and forgoes use of the work, only the individual is the loser. When the scholar forgoes the use of a prior work, not only does his own work suffer, but the public is deprived of his contribution to knowledge. The scholar’s work, in other words, produces external benefits from which everyone profits. In such a case, the fair use doctrine acts as a form of subsidy — albeit at the first author’s expense — to permit the second author to make limited use of the first author’s work for the public good. 26Sony Corp v. Universal City Studios, 464 US 417, 477-78 (1984); see also Williams & Wilkins v. US, 487 F.2d 1345, 1352-53 (Ct of Claims 1973).

Think of it this way. the idea-expression distinction sets the boundaries of what is covered by the First Amendment. The question is not whether using another’s expression is “protected” or “unprotected” but rather whether it falls within the First Amendment’s scope at all. Even then, we have long recognized that some uses of expression should be allowed, and that’s where fair use kicks in. Fair use balances the free speech interests of the public and subsequent creator against those of the original creator.

Both these doctrines adequately address first amendment concerns within copyright law. The free speech critique of copyright essentially argues that courts should address these concerns a second time in a separate analysis. But to date, courts have found no need to ask the same question twice.

Schnapper v. Foley, 667 F.2d 102 (DC Cir 1981), discusses the hypothetical situation of the government using copyright as a pretext for actual censorship. The court said, “Underlying the appellants’ First Amendment assault on the copyright obtained for ‘Equal Justice Under Law’ is their professed concern that the Government may one day attempt to use the copyright law as an instrument of censorship … We are aware that there is at least a theoretical possibility that some copyright laws may be used by some nations as instruments of censorship … We are unaware, however, of any effort on the part of the United States Government to throttle free expression through use of the copyright laws, and we are not inclined to hypothesize such an effort nor to hand down a decision invalidating an act of Congress on that hypothetical basis … We are confident that should the day come when the Government denies someone access to a work produced at its direction on the basis of a copyright, and if the doctrine of fair use and the distinction between an idea and its expression fail to vindicate adequately that person’s interests — although we have no reason to believe that they would — the courts of the United States would on the basis of facts, not hypotheses, consider afresh the First Amendment interests implicated thereby.”

5.

↑

Blackstone defined freedom of the press as freedom solely from prior restraints, “not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published.”

See Eldred v. Ashcroft, 537 US 186, 221 (2003): “The First Amendment securely protects the freedom to make — or decline to make — one’s own speech; it bears less heavily when speakers assert the right to make other people’s speeches.”

Seems to really be a telling story when a child uses a song but has to pay absurd amounts to use it for charity purposes.

I kind of take issue with you saying the first copyright issues didn’t happen until 1969…

Was it not Mark Twain that fought for their extension and was it not the US that didn’t respect foreign copyright until the Berne Convention? That seems like a large error to make.

” By providing incentives to invest in creating and disseminating works, copyright drives new expression and ideas into the public sphere, benefiting everyone. Copyright infringement, especially wholesale piracy, short-circuits these incentives, creating a chilling effect on the creation of new works. Creators also have a continuing speech interest in their works, which copyright helps protect.”

Again with the dubious argument…

Donkey Kong from Nintendo was made out of a transformation of the work of King Kong. Had Universal never lost that fair use case, we would not have an icon that is a staple in the game history.

See also sprite comics based off of popular 8bit – 32 bit games. Webcomics infringe on the copyrights of others, however, fair use and parody allow them to continue to exist without expensive lawsuits. The DMCA, by all means, seems to be unconstitutional since it has a chilling effect on artists of remixes or otherwise lesser known people.

It is unfortunate but this fails on seeing the rights of other creators or distributors that supposedly need the permission of one artist or creator. There are truly no redresses for inaccurate assumptions made by creators against customers.

No wonder more artists and bands seem to forgo copyright law to try something entirely unique to their situation. Copyright law has been used for far too long against them in a manner that does little to truly benefit them.

I kind of take issue with you saying the first copyright issues didn’t happen until 1969…

Was it not Mark Twain that fought for their extension and was it not the US that didn’t respect foreign copyright until the Berne Convention? That seems like a large error to make.
Read it again, since that’s not what I said. The relationship between the First Amendment and copyright is what didn’t receive attention until 1969.

Wow! The different world we would have if not for “donkey kong”….. This is a typical reach for the people still crying for “copyright reform”. Of course young bands or anyone for that matter can choose to do anyting with their works- including give them away and ignore the property rights inherent to any creator. This is not a “wake up call” for others. There are millions of instances of companies giving away products trying to create demand. It isnt the first steps in launching some bold new economic revolution- it is just marketing 101.

Aa an Englishman I feel a certain schadenfreude in contemplating the knots Americans tie themselves in to interpret their Constitution. Like the Irishman in the story, ‘I wouldn’t start from here’.

But seriously, in 1791, when the First Amendment was ratified, I’m sure no-one dreamed that it negated the copyright provision of the original Constitution, as adopted only a few years earlier. As Madison wrote in the Federalist (No. 43) ‘The utility of this power [to legislate for patents and copyright] will scarcely be questioned. The copy right of authors has been solemnly judged in Great Britain to be a right at common law. The right to useful inventions, seems with equal reason to belong to the inventors. The public good fully coincides in both cases with the claims of individuals.’ If the drafters of the First Amendment had wished to repeal the copyright provision, they would have been a good deal more specific and explicit about their aim.

As an Englishman you are certainly more perceptive about the US Constitution than many here in the US. One only need read the initial proposals for the Bill of Rights, and particularly the 12 proposed by Thomas Jefferson, to understand why I say this as it relates to the First Amendment and Article 1, Section 8, Clause 8 of the Constitution.

I want to point out 2 things:
1. You mention this: “Copyright protection doesn’t cover ideas, only the expression of those ideas. “, and I think this is where the disconnect between the people who believe the current direction of copyright laws is stifling innovation and are draconian in their slavish following of the big-money media giants, and those that believe “we’re a bunch of pirates”. If this statement WERE TRUE in the courts today, there’d be a lot more agreement between the two sides, but it’s not, and that’s where most of the conflict comes in. What is happening today is a push towards (legally) making the IDEA the important part, not the execution (you can see this with the hoarding of patents, the Righthaven types, and the ridiculously over-broad technological patents). Somehow in the discussion between the “moral crusaders” and the “pirates”, this fact gets ommitted. It’s not that “copyrights are bad”, it’s that copyright law is being mis-used.

2. Your reference in the quoted text to the “tape pirate” – If this person tapes duplicate recordings of other people’s work and THEN CONDUCTS COMMERCE WITH THEM, they are clearly in violation of existing copyright law and should be punished. The difference comes in when they are told they can’t make a tape, of their own music, and listen to it themselves. Now, you might say “that doesn’t happen”, and it doesn’t…with cassette tapes, but what’s the difference between that, and uploading songs to Amazon’s music locker? It’s my music, I paid for it, now I want to copy it so I can listen to it in multiple places.. how does this affect the copyright holder? How is it any different from the “tape pirate”, assuming you’re not SELLING the copies? How can someone I paid for a product, then determine HOW and WHEN I use the product I purchased? It would be the same as saying “The CD costs $8 when you listen to it at home, but if you’re going to listen to it in the car, that’ll be $14”.. it just doesn’t make any sense.

I enjoyed this piece, but I think these two points are the ones most of the “tech bloggers” (veiled reference to techdirt.com?) TRY to point out… unfortunately they generally get drowned out by the screams of “you just want everything for free!!!”… which for the record isn’t true.

It reminds me of the abortion discussions, where from the pro-life side you’re either against abortion, or FOR IT… never mind that dirt word “choice”.

1. I don’t understand your examples. Two of them concern patents, not copyrights, and the other concerns litigation that I don’t personally agree with but that certainly is about copying expression rather than ideas.

About

Copyhype provides news and info on current developments relating to copyright law, the media industries, and the digital economy. It cuts through the hype to bring reasoned discussion aimed at both legal and nonlegal audiences.

Terry Hart is currently VP Legal Policy and Copyright Counsel at the Copyright Alliance. Any opinions expressed on this site remain his own and not necessarily those of his present or any past employers.